Revenge of the Sith: Nothing I say could spoil it, because you already know that Darth Vader is Luke and Laura's--sorry, Luke and Leia's--father, Senator Palpatine is the Emperor, and that Anakin Skywalker becomes Darth Vader. Oh, you didn't? Where the fuck have you been?
A few impressions (where the fuck have I been?):
* Only when I was 15 and "Return of the Jedi" came out did I learn there was an Emperor.** Who would have thought, from "Star Wars" (which I will go to my grave not calling "A New Hope") and "The Empire Strikes Back," that Darth Vader didn't reign supreme?
** Maybe, if the Emperor was ever mentioned in the first two (was he?) I blocked him out, because Darth Vader was scary enough. This is kind of like Aslan being enough and the Emperor-over-the-Sea, whose son Aslan is, seeming like overkill.***
*** Narnia might have occurred to me because one of the plethora of previews was for "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," which will be out in December. I wonder how much it will suck and how much its production will derive from "Lord of the Rings." Confidence is high, however. I am a sucker.
(The movie is titled as Peter Jackson did his: "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe." Not "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Magician's Nephew." Know why? Because to reorder a set of books, even if to the author's wishes, so that the first one explains the magic of the entire series, is to render the Chronicles lifeless. At least the movie industry is not so stupid. Also this titling implies that others might follow. I expect that "The Last Battle" might have a better movie audience than book audience, given that another preview was for "Revelations," which looked like either part of or distilled from the "Left Behind" drivels.)
Overall, much less sucky than the other two. It had more scenes of Yoda fighting, which seemed more natural and less deus ex machina than in "Attack of the Clones." It didn't have any goddamn stupid pod races or zipping through a Bladerunneresque city's air traffic or navigating a "Chicken Run" pie-making-machine gauntlet (to clarify: that was great in "Chicken Run"; in "Attack of the Clones," it was stupid and derivative).
Most of all, I wish I had been stronger and resisted going to the first in a theatre, which viewing compelled me to succumb to the subsequent two. "Sucking less" doesn't equate to "unsucky enough to be worth it."
P.S. Anthony Lane, I love you: "The general opinion of "Revenge of the Sith" seems to be that is marks a distinct improvement on the last two episodes....True, but only in the same way that dying from natural causes is preferable to crucifixion" (The New Yorker, 23 May 2005).
P.P.S. Anthony Lane, allow me my childhood heroes. He says, "...What's with the screwy syntax? Deepest mind in the galaxy, apparently, and you still express yourself like a day-tripper with a dog-eared phrase book. 'I hope right you are.' Break me a fucking give." (Ibid.) Except that Yoda wasn't a childhood hero. I thought he was just a Muppet--and he was--and didn't come around to doting on him until the rerelease of "Star Wars" (which was, frankly, the first time I had thought of him in a zillion years). I need to introduce "break me a fucking give" into my idiolect.